Thread by @pptsapper

Maybe *prominently* highlighting a senior Nazi and the dude whose troops conducted the Malmedy massacre isn't a good look, PAOs

Like, c'mon y'all. This isn't that hard

https://twitter.com/USArmyPAO/status/1206725290992570368

PAOs: we gonna finally incorporate history into our posts

Army historians:

Like, I'm sitting here just waiting for them to talk about the 18 dudes of the intelligence and reconnaissance platoon of the 394th Infantry who destroyed a whole Nazi paratrooper battalion and delayed the Nazi advance by 18 whole hours at Lanzerath Ridge

One of my favorite parts of the story is that they and their PL trade captured German stuff with other units to get additional machine guns and an armored jeep with a .50 Cal mounted on it

That alone is so quintessentially Army that is just makes my heart warm

That PL was Lieutenant Lyle Bouck, jr, who enlisted into the @Missouri_NG at the age of FOURTEEN because that's what you could do in those days. He did it for the drill pay that helped his father support their small family. He was supply sergeant at the outset of the war

With the 35th Infantry Division, Bouck heads off to the Aleutian Islands where he is so miserable that he applies for OCS

That's pretty miserable

He graduated in the top ten in his class, earning the dubious of honor of staying at Benning & teaching the next class

At Benning for about a year, he was then ordered to the 99th Division, and by 1944, he's in Europe as a 20yo platoon leader, scrounging gear for his guys, leading patrols, and generally tearing it up

Until the advance gets too far; overexposed. And then the Nazis counterattack

And that's how 20yo Bouck finds his little platoon bearing the brunt of the Nazi attack -- his dudes were dug in, had great fields of fire, and the Germans were poorly trained. Assault after assault hit their position, as enemy guns registered on them

Cutoff. Surrounded.

But Bouck hangs on, because that's what his orders say to do. The Nazis finally are able to close in and go foxhole to foxhole, capturing all the men. One US Soldier was KIA. The rest were wounded and captured. But they held a whole Nazi column an entire day. Time is victory.

Bouck's captivity is pretty horrific. Force marched to trains, loaded up, days without food or water. Men died around him. He makes a prisoner escape once he's in a camp, but is wounded and captured again. All this time, he has no idea that his platoon had NOT failed

He thought the action was a disgrace. Instead, he was surprised to learn that the delaying action the platoon conducted had been key to reversing Nazi gains at the Bulge

You just never really know, in the fog of war, what will make a difference

Bouck goes home, married sweetheart, and we could leave things here, everyone feeling good.

Instead, Bouck has to fight to get his backpay as POW, which he gets - but as a staff sergeant, not a captain. & while he gets recognition, his men don't, frustrating him even more

So Bouck leaves the Army, uses his GI Bill, and becomes a chiropractor.

In 1981, after considerable lobbying, Bouck and his platoon are FINALLY recognized with valor awards: 4 DSCs, 5 Silver Stars, 10 BSMs with V device.

Bouck passed away just three years ago, in 2016